


Equilibrium

by PoliticalPadmé (magnetgirl)



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebellion Era - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Complicated Relationships, F/M, Friends to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:02:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21677941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnetgirl/pseuds/PoliticalPadm%C3%A9
Summary: Hera and Rex fall into something resembling a relationship.
Relationships: CT-7567 | Rex/Hera Syndulla
Comments: 6
Kudos: 19
Collections: Star Wars Rare Pairs Exchange 2019





	Equilibrium

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ambiguously](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambiguously/gifts).



Hera likes order. She likes plans and history. She likes goals and lists. She learned early on in her association with the Rebellion not to write any of it down. The Empire has eyes everywhere. But she still keeps lists in her head, and for the really important stuff, encrypted in her droid. War is always chaotic and the war against the Empire is being fought across the galaxy by a collection of disparate groups held together by a hidden leadership. Hera needs her routines to stay calm in the midst of the storm.

It's harder on Hoth than it was on Yavin. Hoth is cold and dark and unforgiving. And murder on tech. All the ships are breaking down, she's taken to running daily diagnostics on the Ghost, and Chopper spends every other minute whining about the snow. But mostly she misses her family.

Kanan remains a hole in her heart. She's used to his absence, used to sleeping alone. Ezra and Ahsoka are somewhere out there, but nowhere any of them can reach. And now Zeb and Sabine are off on their own missions, too. They're needed where they are but Hera can't help feeling left behind. And alone. 

Jacen is on Ryloth with Cham. He can run now and that's too dangerous for a place like Hoth. She knows it's temporary, she expects her own new assignment any day. And she knows it's safe, and the best thing for both her son and her father. But she's lonely, and she's anxious. She still has Chopper and Rex and she's bonded with Han over temperamental machines, but she misses having everyone with her where she can see them. 

Hera likes control. There's no control to be found in weather or war.

It's the worst at night. In the daylight she is a ball of energy, handling everything there is to handle. Keeping everyone else afloat. Making her lists, checking off each item as she accomplishes it, adding new ones as they come up. In the daylight she appears to have everything in hand. She is sympathetic as needed, strong as needed, a problem solver, a shoulder to cry on. In the daylight, she is surrounded by people who need her and things that need doing. In the dark, she is surrounded by ghosts and mistakes and things she should have done or can't undo. 

Rex is a caretaker and always has been. Anakin and Ahsoka were too headstrong for their own good. Wolffe and Gregor, too. Rex was the sensible one, the cautious one. It's how he survived, how he's still surviving. He looks after himself and he looks after his people. Who his people are shifts now and then, but they can all be described as the ones who need the most looking after. Lately, it's Hera. 

No one else has noticed. The rebels are busy trying to save the galaxy and heartbreak is the norm. And Hera is dependable. They believe her when she says she's fine because it's easier and because it's always been true. But Rex knows better. Rex recognizes her tension, the exhaustion the pretense of fine creates. It haunts him. And he refuses to lose her to it.

It starts simply. He makes sure she eats. He makes sure she sleeps, or at least goes to bed, and he guards her door. Some nights, when it's particularly bad, he sits next to her bed. He drags her outside on the pretext of patrol and the premise that fresh air is good for them. He won't let her work more than three hours at a time, just shows up and gets in the way until she takes a break. He arranges a secure line to Ryloth as often as possible, and it isn't very often, but it's something. She sleeps better those nights.

Weeks pass and it becomes habit to eat together, to walk together, to sleep together. She holds his hand in the dark and they both feel less alone.

Han thinks all the attention is adorable, calls Rex her boyfriend until Hera turns it back on him and the princess. Rex is embarrassed. 

"I didn't mean to put you in an awkward position." Hera outranks him and if people realize he's a clone…not to mention the memory of Kanan, if rumors somehow reached her family...

"You didn't. Han just likes to get under everyone's skin." She laughs it off but Rex still worries.

It happens by accident. They're delayed returning to base on one of their walks. The sun sets when they're still a clip out and the temperature, already below freezing, drops another twenty degrees immediately. By the time they get inside the hanger ice is hanging off their clothes. They head straight to her ship, to her room, to her shower. They are single minded, seeking warmth, they don't even notice what they are doing until it's done.

Hera stands, naked, blinking at his equally naked body. They'd brushed fingers when they both reached for the switch to turn on the water. His reach is longer, he finds the switch before she pulls back and four nozzles blast hot water between them. She's stopped cold, he's ashamed, but cognizant that she's still losing body heat and dehydrated, and he ignores her dread and his embarrassment and pulls her into the water to warm her. He holds her steady as steam fills the room and their body temperature rises. His body reacts without his permission but he ignores that too. She's silent, watching his chest rise and fall, matching her breath to his. She draws a finger above his heart, tracing a scar, one of many. His name catches in her throat and she closes the space between them, suddenly, desperately. Her hands snake behind his head and tip it down to meet her lips, her teeth. They grope at each other in the water, their bodies moving without permission of their mind, letting go of propriety, grasping for comfort, for connection, for release.

Eventually they leave the shower and stumble for the bed. She falls into it, spent, her skin still paler than usual. He tucks the blanket around her body, her lekku limp with fatigue. He wants to kiss her, press his lips to the crinkled space between her eyes, to banish her tension. But he doesn't dare. He pulls soft pants on and takes up his place on the floor. He thinks, perhaps, it's more appropriate to leave, but then she would be alone and he won't abide that. He's drifting off when he feels her fingers on his shoulder.

He glances up, wide green eyes are watching him. "I don't want to be alone."

He closes his hand over her fingers and crawls up into the bed. She sighs, content, and lets her eyes close as he repositions the blanket over them both, curls his body around hers, his hand across her belly, his lips brush her shoulder as they drift into unconsciousness. 

They don't discuss it. Rex is consumed with guilt. Hera is afraid. Outwardly nothing changes. They are together more than not and at night they share a room, often a bed, sometimes each other. They don't discuss it and they don't define it and slowly it becomes routine.

Hera is assigned to a recon mission. It allows her to reunite with Jacen, and Zeb and Kallus, too. Rex returns to his old quarters, his old status. Their eyes meet now and then. Their knees brush under a table.They still don't discuss it.

Years go by. Hera and Rex fall into an understanding. When they are alone they come together. But the war progresses quickly. Hera is needed in the sky and Rex is better on the ground. They're not together when they win. 

"Your boyfriend's looking for you."

"What?"

Han smiles. Hera is flustered as she realizes what he means.

"Oh!" she exclaims.

"Oh," he repeats and his smile widens. "Third fire." He indicates the direction with his chin. She nods and starts to move away. "Hera."

She glances back. Han's expression turns serious, earnest. "Let yourself be happy." He glances around, shrugs. "We won."

She runs to the third fire. Rex is seated, surrounded by his peers, rebels all, and more than a bit tipsy. Hera stops just out of the light. He's not looking for her - Han was being Han and meddling where he shouldn't. She doesn't belong here. He's happy. It's enough.

She takes a picture with her mind, captures the moment in her memory. Files it away with the details of their long term, undefined, never discussed, love affair. And then slips away into the night.

But he finds her. Maybe Han meddled again or maybe someone else did. It is not as terrible a thought as it might once have been. Hera’s heart is wide enough to love the living and the dead, the lost and the found. 

He finds her alone, gaze tilted up to the stars. Jacen is in sight, running with ewoks, free. Rex sits beside her to watch.

"We won," she murmurs and turns her eyes to his. 

"What do we do now?"

"Oh." She reaches for his cheek, his beard scratches her hand as he leans into it. Her eyes twinkle. "I have some ideas."


End file.
